On Tue, Nov 5, 2013 at 6:02 PM, Yuvi Panda
<yuvipanda(a)gmail.com> wrote:
On Tue, Nov 5, 2013 at 5:57 PM, Erik Moeller
<erik(a)wikimedia.org> wrote:
Option D: We come up with some kind of open
process for
designating/confirming folks as architects, according to some
well-defined criteria (including minimum participation in the RFC
process, well-defined domain expertise in certain areas, a track
record of constructive engagement, etc.). Organizations like WMF can
choose to recognize this role as they see fit (likely according salary
increases to individuals who demonstrate successful architectural
leadership), but it’s a technical leadership role that’s awarded by
Wikimedia’s larger technical community, similar to +2 status.
I like this in theory, though I fear that this will somehow lead to a
state in some ways similar to the enwiki RfA process...
Yeah.
I'm in favor of option (C), mainly because I think that titles are
pointless and
lead to hat collecting and hurt feelings. I respect Brion, Mark and Tim (and
many others) as architects because they *are* architects, not because we
call them such.
+1 (Although also ok with option (A) as I have an immense amount of
respect for the people currently in this role and am totally fine with
them having fancy titles to recognize all they've done)
To be honest I'm kind of unclear what precisely an "architect" does
that a non-architect can't. To date the only thing I've seen is be the
final judge on RFCs (and basically push the process forward). What
other activities are they doing that they need scaling on? I suppose
I'm considering these people's general role in guiding MediaWiki
development to not be so much part of their architect role since they
have been doing that long before they got the title, and in theory
(and probably in practise) other people can share in that
responsibility.
----
In particular I really don't like the idea of voting people into a
formal leadership position. RfA's, votes for +2's are votes because
they are associated with technical abilities. While sometimes these
positions are also associated with leadership or authority, that's not
their primary function (or shouldn't be imo). If no tools are
involved, I feel a vote would be a pure popularity contest, which
aren't healthy.
Leadership is something that someone does, its not something that
someone can be appointed into (Although opinions no doubt differ on
that).
Cheers,
--Bawolff